Recent Posts
In Singapore most young adults usually think that we have a lousy bargain in terms of the ruling PAP government. But the recent Thailand election has been quite an eye opener for some, though being a typical human, people are usually only concerned with matters affecting them. I found this video, and thought it’s quite an interesting video. Most people always look things from their own point of view. But the things affecting us is affecting the world (Inflation, social unrest, unemployment, asset prices going mad, etc) Take a look at this video from the Malaysian point of view. There are probably a few more worth looking at.. (eg: Greece 40% unemployment for young adults. Spain 20% unemployment, etc) Perhaps we’re all demanding too much for our own...
read more
In classical economics, price discrimination is when an identical product is sold for different prices to different customer segments. Of course, theoretically this should not happen, but we see it all the time! A Sweet Talk bubble tea sold at a busy MRT station can be $1.80, whereas a location slightly further away from the same MRT station can be sold for $1.50. A dress sold at a pushcart can cost $20, while the exact same dress (since most pushcarts and blogshops tend to get it from the same manufacturer) can be sold for $16 online. Likewise, airlines practice price discrimination in order to maximise their profit. People who are willing to book tickets 9 months in advance can get tickets as low as $1 (not including taxes that is), whereas people booking tickets 3 days before a flight would have to pay a premium. However, there is yet another form of price discrimination that people don’t usually know about. The booking of 2 single trips VS a return trip! Take a look at the fares above. I got the screen shots within 5minutes of each other. At this point of time according to XE, the THB to SGD rate is 0.0403021. So, a return fare is S$246.90, whereas 2 single trips booked is S$114.95 + THB2699.00*0.0403021 (S$108.78)= S$223.73! A savings of S$23.17 with just 5 to 10 minutes of additional effort! Of course, your credit companies might charge you a lousier rate for the exchange, but they would typically not charge more than 1% spread. I use Mustafa Forex as a typical money changer indication, and they are currently quoting 0.040/0.0409. Based on Visa’s rate and a administrative fee rate of 2.5%, I got 0.0416. That means at worst, you would be charged S$112.28 for the BKK to SG single trip. That’s still a saving of S$20 or so. Likewise for another airline, A return fare costs S$222.87, whereas 2 single trips costs S$80 + THB3570 * 0.0403021 (S$143.88) = S$223.88. In this case, there is...
read more
Social experiments are quite a funny thing. On 1 hand, people may feel cheated when they find out they were involuntarily part of a social experiment. On the other hand, it exposes us to the good(or bad) nature of humans when we are unaware of the experiment.. A group of 4 girls decided to do a social experiment 1 day, inspired by a movie, Living Without Money, which talks about how a woman who decided to stop using money and to live a life based on exchanging favours. The question was, can it be done in Singapore? Singapore is always known to be a place full of apathetic, jaded people. Particularly so after the numerous charity fiascos like Joachim Kang, NKF, Ren Ci, and potentially a City Havest Church one. People suddenly became very tight with the purse when it came to random people coming up to them on the streets to ask for donation for <insert name here> charity. So the plan was to go out to food places, and try to get a meal without paying for it. They tried it out on 4 different types of establishments and well, it’s interesting how people reacted. Enough said. Read more at their blog! For 1, I don’t think I have the courage to go out and ask people for...
read more
I had a shock this morning while checking my emails when I saw an order delivery email from iHerb since I didn’t order anything from them recently. However, after reading through the rest of the emails, I realized that there is a social media department in iHerb and they saw my blog entry on iHerb where I talked about where you can get supplements cheap and fast. One of my most commonly ordered product is the Omega 3 fishoils which I think everybody should be taking and iHerb actually sent me a bottle for free! So a big shout out to Abby and the rest of you guys at iHerb for the pleasant surprise! Till date, I have did numerous orders with iHerb and all the experiences have been pleasant. Hassle free ordering process, cheap shipping starting from US$4 to Singapore, and relatively quick delivery times. Using express delivery which costs more but would make sense for big orders takes only 3-5 working days, and international airmail takes slightly less than 2 weeks. Most of the time, the supplements available are at least 20-50% cheaper than retail shops in Singapore, and thats including shipping to your doorstep! Even some of the weird supplements like those used in the Tim Ferriss Slow Carb Diet (The 4 Horsemen of Fat Loss) can be found there cheaply! Besides those points mentioned above, go check out the 10 reasons to make iHerb your number 1...
read more
Group deal sites have been around for the longest time, and I actually signed up to receive updates for quite a few. However, I have not found any deals attractive enough to buy them. Mostly, the deals just didn’t seem all that attractive. Some of the deals are discounted off retail price, such that when you compare it to prices you can get at the shops, it’s only marginally cheaper. In other cases, the locations are not exactly the most convenient, so you usually won’t go or do that event on a wimp and would require a bit of schedule planning. I prefer a little bit of spontaneity in my life 🙂 But I finally did it! I bought the $35 for 1 Month Club Membership + 60 min Health Assessment + 4 VibroGym Sessions at Lifestyle Fitness (Worth $645) deal from groupon.sg. Essentially, this is not significantly cheaper than most commercial gyms. At some point of time, California Fitness or True Fitness were going at around $30-45/month for a 1-2 years plan. So at $35, its within that range. The main reason why I did buy it is because of 2 main reasons. 1) I’m on a diet/fitness regime now, and 2) the location is right opposite my office! Best deal ever 🙂 Will I buy more groupon deals? Perhaps. Deals like, $6 for 1 Manhattan Fish ‘n Chips at The Manhattan FISH MARKET (Worth $13.90), $3.25 for Any 6-Inch Sub (Worth up to $6.50) at 7 Subway Outlets or $5 for 1 Main Ramen or Rice at RamenPlay (Worth $10.80) does seem cheap and worth it. But seeing how 10,000 to 30,000 coupons for each has been bought, I wonder how the shops can cope with it and also if QC will drop. For 30,000 coupons, and with a typical validity of 6 months, that means they would have to serve additional 5000 purchases at a heavily discounted price. Do note, groupon does take a cut of the coupon price, which means more retailers might suffer...
read more
Marriage is one of the most memorable thing in a person’s life. It marks the start of a new chapter in the lives of 2 individuals when they decide that they are willing to put aside a part of themselves to stand together as a couple. I once heard a quote, and thought it’s really quite true. “Monogamy is when a person decides that staying together is more worthwhile than chasing personal wants.” However social dynamics have changed significantly in the last 10 years, and one of the things I have been pondering about is marriage. The main reason is actually because most of my peers are starting to get married, and I have attended 8 weddings in 6 months! But that’s not the only things I have observed. I have seen quite a number of shotgun marriages, a number of people getting married for the sake of moving out from parents, and a few divorces, separations and annulments. From that, I believe in the next 10 years, there will be far less marriages than now. Let’s look at it logically. Since I’m a guy, I will largely present the guy’s point of view. I believe guys get married for 4 main reasons, Family pride and name One of the main reasons why guy’s get married is for the family name. This is one of those deeply ingrained asian culture that we have. In India, a person’s choice of a spouse is irrelevant. The parent’s choice is more important. In most chinese, the surname and family name is a very significant thing. Having family culture and future generation was probably one of the biggest concern of our parents and grandparents time. Even for myself, when I was in secondary school, one of my considerations when looking for a girlfriend was if she would be a good mother to my kids. (Okay fine. Go giggle behind my back). This has been diluting a lot these days, where personal desires are more important than family desires. Some couples...
read more
